Lemurijos muiliukai

November soap challenge club goal was to make soap using similar technique to the one used to paint on canvas with fluid acrylic paint.I am making and selling all natural artisan soaps for 12 years now, big batches. I am very passionate about everything soapy, this is my hobby turned to a living. I was following all soap challenges with excitement. Bought myself several smaller molds to try all the exiting techniques, just never had a nerve to enter the actual challenge. When first acrylic pouring technique was announced in July, I wanted to know what this is all about. I watched some acrylic pouring videos on you tube and was so impressed, that I decided to give it a try. I bought paint, floetrol, silicon, etc and after first pour I new, that I've got a new addiction. The process of pouring the paint, watching colors play is so satisfying and relaxing, just pure meditation. My husband likes it too, so we do pouring together. He comes to my studio after work and we play with paints together. Some evenings we would do one pour, sometimes two and we loved every one of them. It is more like art therapy for us, process itself is most important, but apparently friends and family liked the end result as well. Wow, double happy. Couldn't resist the temptation to show some of our pours, so here they are.

Now moving on to the soap.First soap was trial version in a small mold. For colors I used madder root extract for pink, red clay and strong indigo infusion in oil. I filled two cups with white base and then poured colors like I would do with the paint, allowing them to start mixing in the cup, then put the mold on top of the cups and flipped over. Result wasn't exactly what I was expecting, still got some nice pattern on the side.

Next try was flipping cups in the big mold. I filed 5 paper cups 250ml each, put sheet of plexiglas on top, flipped over, slid them in to the mold and then lifted. I used carrot juice for yellow, spirulina for green (disappeared almost completely), French rouse clay and alkanet with a dash of red clay.Here is uncut photo. Is it just me or you can see the dragon too?

And the cut soap.

I am using only natural colorants in my soaps, so I thought maybe it is time to try some bright artificial colors. I wanted soft pastel colors, hoping they would mix nicely creating different shades. Chose turquoise, magenta, pink and violet, hoping they would mix well without madding effect. I poured batter in pvc pipes, then tilted one side of the mold and let soap slip slowly through the bottom of the pipe gently releasing it bit by bit. After some moving of rhe batter in the mold, I gently tilted one end, letting soap flow to one side and inserted homemade divider to give it more height.

Soap was gelling well, still got some strange ash on top, which gave more interesting frosty look to the flower pattern. Named it "Frosted flowers".

At this point I was done with artificial and went back to my clays. For the next soap I've used orange, pink and yellow French Argiletz clays plus added some bamboo charcoal. The colors didn't mix well, because orange clay had somewhat overpowering effect. I did shake it vigorously from side to side, didn't spin it, although it looks like spin. I covered it and left, because it was late and I wanted to go home. I forgot to sprinkle alcohol on top as well. Soap didn't gel well and formed some serious ash on top, which I liked, because it turned out like some crazy surrealistic a la Salvador Dali soap and ash added additional zing to it.

I wanted to try one more soap with more dripping on the top. Just three colors this time: white, red (clay) and dark violet (alkanet with red clay). Last minute decided to add some indigo too. First I poured in one pvc pipe alternating colors with white, then same metod in the separate container and from container did this one spot - vortex pouring. Leftover white poured in to the mold.

After lifting of the pipes I was shaking mold vigorously from side to side. Apparently that approach works best with this technique. I was quite happy with this soap. Everything went very smooth, the batter was just the right consistency, colors were mixing well and pattern was somewhat soft feather like. Initially I thought I would add a lot of drops, but then changed my mind not to overpower the soft pattern, wich again came out somewhat surrealistic.

Soap was gelling well and the cut soap has this smooth, even consistency and the smell is good too. I added lemongrass, lavender and a touch of orange blossom. Lemongrass gave to the white this soft creamy yellowish tint, witch goes well with the choice of my colors.